


inferno

by 4wholecats



Series: Whumptober 2020 [14]
Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Thracia 776
Genre: Child Death, Fire, Gen, Graphic Description of Corpses, Nightmares, Pre-Canon, Prompt: Fire, Whumptober 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-04
Updated: 2020-11-04
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:21:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27376372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/4wholecats/pseuds/4wholecats
Summary: The sand tickles his face as the wind blows past. He stares down at the bodies in the sand as they cook under the sun’s rays; two adults and a child.
Series: Whumptober 2020 [14]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1959316
Kudos: 11





	inferno

**Author's Note:**

> oops! all suffering!  
> sorry if theres grammar mistakes my brain feels like its full of bees today

Finn doesn’t know what Sigurd looked like as he burned. He was privileged enough to not be present when Belhalla was consumed by inferno, having been tasked with the care of Leif at the time. His imagination gets the best of him though... in times like these. Lord Sigurd’s death could not have been quick, that would have been too kind a fate for the man. Finn pictures him, hair and clothing burning as he stumbles off his horse, screaming his wife’s name until his vocal chords melt and he is reduced to ash.

It’s a realistic picture. One based on sights that haunt Finn even now, years later. He saw knights of Leonster slumped on the ground, bleeding to death as flames licked at their armor. He saw women and children cornered by great walls of flame, choking as he ran. He saw the castle torched from the inside out as his horse heaved onwards, the boy in his arms transfixed by the spires of smoke reaching up into the sky. Leif was too young to remember the carnage, but the heat of the fire mixes with the arid air of Yied in Finn’s mind as he sleeps. He coughs up blood that is not his own.

The sand tickles his face as the wind blows past. He stares down at the bodies in the sand as they cook under the sun’s rays; two adults and a child.

Finn sucks in a desperate breath as he watches the heat melt the little girl’s eyeballs, fighting paralysis as they turn to mush and run down her face like egg whites. Fire catches on her dress, and her skin bubbles and dissolves beneath. It drips like wax, congealing with the sand to form horrific red clumps that slither towards him of their own accord. He stands as they approach, unable to help but unwilling to run. Bile builds in his throat as the blood-soaked sand is buried under a layer of hot orange wrath that licks at his clothing. He tears his gaze from the corpses, and out there in the haze he sees nothing but the inferno. He stands alone in the bowels of Hell. 

“Finn?”

He looks to the ground again, and the smallest skeleton is closer now. Had he stepped forward, or did she crawl to him while he was distracted by the rapture all around them?

Her skull turns to him, charred and sand-filled. Her jaw shakes. She opens her mouth.

Finn jerks forward, gasping as the skull’s cries fade from his mind. He dislodges something heavy from his chest, and the lump rolls to the side and squeals. Leif’s face blinks at him, confused and upset about being tossed away so suddenly. He squirms back over to the bedroll and tucks himself into Finn’s side as the knight lays back down.

A dream. 

Nothing but another dream.

“Finn?”

He looks around for the source of the voice. Nanna, only five years old, stares back inquisitively. 

“Did you call me?” Finn’s voice is reedy and dry.

“I wanna make food.” Nanna crouches near the burned out fire pit from the night before. She squats in the dirt without her shoes, the bottom of her ratty dress flecked with ash and muck. Finn swallows thickly and crawls out of the bedroll, slower this time so as to not disturb Leif again.

Nanna’s found an egg. Finn doesn’t know what animal it’s from, only that she’s put it in the bottom of their dirty metal pan, shell and all. She pokes at it with a stick, as if unsure why it was not yet ready to be eaten despite being placed in cookware. Finn takes the stick from her, and throws it into the ash pit.

“You have to cook it, to make sure it’s safe to eat,” he says gently. He takes the flint in his hand, hesitating before striking. The vision of a girl’s skull flashes before his eyes before he shoves the dream aside yet again. The fire is lit without incident, and Nanna watches intensely as Finn prepares the egg for her.

He doesn’t go back to bed when he’s done, preferring instead to watch the already dwindling flames. Nanna chows down with fervor. It’s a chicken’s egg, and Finn has suspicions that she might have stolen it; ill intent or not. She yawns when she’s done, flopping backwards and closing her eyes, content to sleep right there in the dirt. Well, it wasn’t as if the bedroll was any cleaner... 

Finn returns to staring at the smoldering embers.

The red glow dances, mesmerizing. 

Even now… years after the fall of the castle… and the deaths of his lord and lady… the specters haunt him.

The burning corpse flickers in his mind again.

He grabs fistfuls of dry dirt, wincing as small rocks scrape his palms and get caught under his nails.

He throws the dirt purposefully, dousing the remaining coals.

Someday, he silently vows, he will no longer run from fires.


End file.
